/aɪ kʊd ˈiːt ə ˈhɔːs/
English idiom, informal. To be extremely hungry.
Draft Not yet checked by a native English speaker.
How do people use I could eat a horse
?
Informal and cheerful, said about yourself when dinner can’t come soon enough. It’s nearly always a full sentence with “could”, often stretched to “I’m so hungry I could eat a horse”, and it works in the past for other people too: “Tom could have eaten a horse.” Nobody takes it literally, so it’s fine at a family table or with friends.
Also said I could eat a brick
I could eat a horse
in real sentences
-
I could eat a horse.
Tatoeba, sentence by CK, CC BY 2.0 FR
-
I’m so hungry I could eat a horse.
Tatoeba, sentence by CK, CC BY 2.0 FR
Where does I could eat a horse
come from?
Nobody knows who said it first. The earliest quotation English Wiktionary gives is from George Johnston’s novel Skyscrapers in the Mist (1946), but the joke is simple enough that it was probably in speech long before. The horse is just the biggest animal on an ordinary menu of exaggerations, and the phrase is plain hyperbole with no story behind it.
Mistakes learners make with I could eat a horse
Learners mix it up with “eat like a horse”, which means to always eat a lot (a habit). “I could eat a horse” is about how hungry you are right now.
Other English idioms like I could eat a horse
Spot a mistake in I could eat a horse
?
Send a correction, or a sentence you’d actually say with it. Everything is read before anything on this page changes.